Upcoming Events

Ingress Charts and the HBC

Standard

At our most recent Meetup gathering, we had a look at Ingress Charts and Solar Returns. An ingress chart is the chart cast for the moment the Sun, Moon, or any planet moves from 29 degrees of one sign to 0 degrees of the next. A Solar Return chart is the chart set for the moment the Sun returns to the exact degree and minute of the zodiac it occupied in a natal chart. Both can be used to give, what I call, the flavour of the upcoming period in question. For looking at the flavour of a particular calendar year, then, it is often revealing to study the moment the Sun made its ingress into Capricorn at the winter solstice just prior to the beginning of the year. This blog post is about ingress charts; we’ll look at solar returns another time.

I approached my presentation on ingress charts by doing a good-ol’ Google search for major events in Canadian history. One of the “oldest” events was the founding of the Hudson Bay Company on May 2, 1670. This was long before Canada was a country, and the company wasn’t even founded on our native land. But, quirky as astrology is sometimes, casting a chart for the Capricorn ingress of the Sun back at the end of 1669, in Ottawa no less, does suggest that 1670 might be an important year for something to do with sales or trading in this “country of the future”.

In an ingress chart, the real telltale signatures seem to be associated with the chart angles. For example, the actual signs on the Ascendant and Midheaven often tell something about theme of the year to come. If a planet is closely aspecting the chart’s Ascendant or Midheaven, that’s important! If a planet activates the midpoint of the Ascendant and Midheaven (by a multiple of 45 degrees), that’s important! And if the midpoint of two planets falls on a chart angle, that combined symbolism is important, too.

Anyhow, let’s look at the Capricorn ingress for the end of 1669.

Alright, then… Mercury-ruled Gemini is on the Midheaven, Mercury-ruled Virgo on the Ascendant. Mercury is associated with trading, sales, and marketing. In fact, our word merchant comes from the name Mercury itself! Pluto is in a close conjunction with that Midheaven, and Pluto is co-ruler of the 3rd house of sales and trading. The other co-ruler of the 3rd house is Mars, which is also in a very close aspect to the Midheaven.

The Moon in a nation’s ingress chart often refers to the people of a country. And what are these people doing? They are in the third house of the chart, shopping! The Moon is conjunct Mercury. We can even be a bit tongue-in-cheek here and say they are shopping for the latest, everyday, electronic devices, since that Moon is square Uranus in the 6th house.

The Sun itself is tightly square the Ascendant and opposite the Midheaven. Astrologers refer to this Sun as being on the Aries Point (that’s 0 Aries or any of the cardinal points); anything on the Aries Point is destined to shine in the public eye.

The midpoint of Uranus and Neptune, representing the 6th and 7th houses respectively, triggers both the Ascendant and Midheaven of this chart. The 6th house reference could be the everyday items, clothing, etc., and the 7th house could simply be the contract of the sale or trade — the idea that there are customers who want these everyday items.

It was a lot of fun preparing for this talk, and I learned a bit of Canadian history on the side! I’ll likely share more ingress charts in other blog posts. If you’d like to join us at one of our Meetup evenings, our next one is February 15 on the topic of the Progressed Moon.